Sec. C-1. 24 MRSA §2349, sub-§2, ¶A, as amended by PL 1995, c. 342, §2, is further amended to read:
A. That person was covered under an individual or group contract or policy, except for a short-term contract, issued by any insurer, health maintenance organization, nonprofit hospital or medical service organization, or was covered under an uninsured employee benefit plan that provides payment for health services received by employees and their dependents or a governmental program such as Medicaid, the Maine Health Program, as established in Title 22, section 3189, the Maine High-Risk Insurance Organization, as established in Title 24-A, section 6052, and the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services, 10 United States Code, Section 1072, Subsection 4. For purposes of this section, the individual or group contract under which the person is seeking coverage is the "succeeding contract." The group or individual contract or policy or the uninsured employee benefit plan that previously covered the person is the "prior contract or policy"; and
Sec. C-2. 24 MRSA §2349, sub-§2, ¶B, as repealed and replaced by PL 1995, c. 673, Pt. B, §1, is amended to read:
B. Coverage under the prior contract or policy terminated:
(1) Within 180 days before the date the person enrolls or is eligible to enroll in the succeeding contract if:
(a) Coverage was terminated due to unemployment, as defined in Title 26, section 1043;
(b) The person was eligible for and received unemployment compensation benefits for the period of unemployment, as provided under Title 26, chapter 13; and
(c) The person is employed at the time replacement coverage is sought under this provision; or
(2) Within 3 months 90 days before the date the person enrolls or is eligible to enroll in the succeeding contract.
A period of ineligibility for any health plan imposed by terms of employment may not be considered in determining whether the coverage ended within a time period specified under this section.; and
Sec. C-3. 24 MRSA §2349, sub-§2, ¶C is enacted to read:
C. If the prior contract or policy was a Medicare supplement policy as defined in Title 24-A, chapter 67, this section applies only:
(1) If the policy was issued during the open enrollment period pursuant to Title 24-A, section 5005 or section 5010; or
(2) If the policy was issued to replace an earlier policy issued by the same or a different carrier and the insured had continuous coverage beginning in the insured's open enrollment period with no gap in coverage in excess of 90 days, then the waiver of medical underwriting and preexisting conditions exclusions required by subsection 4 apply only to the extent that benefits would have been payable under each of the prior policies if those policies were still in force.
Sec. C-4. 24-A MRSA §2849-B, sub-§1, as repealed and replaced by PL 1995, c. 625, Pt. B, §10, is amended to read:
1. Policies subject to this section. This section applies to all individual, group and blanket medical and blanket insurance policies except hospital indemnity, specified accident, specified disease, long-term care and short-term policies issued by insurers or health maintenance organizations. For purposes of this section, a short-term policy is an individual, nonrenewable policy issued for a term that does not exceed 12 months.
Sec. C-5. 24-A MRSA §2850, sub-§1, as amended by PL 1993, c. 547, §4, is further amended to read:
1. Application. This section applies to individual and group medical insurance contracts subject to chapter chapters 33 and 35, except Medicare supplement contracts, converted contracts issued under section 2809-A and contracts designed to cover specific diseases, hospital indemnity or accidental injury only.
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